Doctors are today starting three days of strikes, the longest continuous walkout in the NHS’s 75-year history.
The British Medical Association warned there could be a mass exodus Down Under if the Tories do not settle the dispute by the summer.
More than 70,000 junior doctors could take part in the first ever three-day walkout, to demand an end to a decade of below-inflation pay deals.
Consultants and nurses will fill in today, but A&Es will have only about half their usual staff.
Dr Rob Laurenson, co-chair of the BMA junior doctors committee, said: “They want to drag us through the mud and turn the public against doctors. But it’s not going to work.
“They need to come up with a very quick resolution. We already have an exodus of doctors going to work in Australia and New Zealand.
“If we get to a point when doctors are making those decisions and the Government hasn’t settled this, then they are setting the NHS up to fail next winter.”
Junior doctors went on strike in 2016 after Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, who was Health Secretary at the time, imposed contract changes that included scrapping overtime rates.
The bitter dispute included only four single-day strikes. Emergency care support was only withdrawn on one of the days. Today, junior doctors will not provide emergency cover.
There are around 80,000 junior doctors in the NHS who start on salaries of between £25,000 and £30,000.
The BMA says the latest 2023 uplift is just 2% at a time when annual inflation is currently 10.7%.
Launching the campaign, it said: “Pret a Manger has announced it will pay up to £14.10 per hour.
"A junior doctor makes just £14.09. Thanks to this Government you can make more serving coffee than saving patients.”
The BMA rejected a Government offer of talks submitted at 10pm on Friday, because it was on condition that the strikes were paused.
PM Rishi Sunak yesterday urged them to get round the table.
He said during a flight to San Diego, where he will meet President Biden: “It is very disappointing that the junior doctors union is not engaging.
“We are actually having constructive dialogue with other unions who have accepted our offer to come in and talk through it. I would urge the junior doctors to follow suit.”
